G. rosea

[valcan222]

Hey everyone, so the past few days i have noticed my G. rosea drinking her water very rappidly. she often even sticks a single leg in it and lays by the dish.. so i have always belived that if you pay attention to a animal they will normaly tell you what they want.. so i was thinking that she may be complaining about humidity. so although i know they like it bone dry i went ahead and misted a small corner of the tank she is in... after about an hour i found her laying directly where i had misted... i have repeated this process for the past week and she is still going threw water like crazy and laying where ever i mist..

so i was curious if anyone else had a experence like this.. she has been fasting for a few months and i was unsure of this behaviour so i figured i would just ask.

so any ideas?


Thanks
Brian

 

[LadySharon]

This is a guess based on simlar activity by one of mine. (B Boehemi)

I'm guessing she is in pre-molt and instinctively wants a bit more humad area for that.

Mine acctually fliped on the dry side of the cage... and an hour later fliped back upright and walked to the wet area and ended up molting there on it's side.

- Sharon

 

[Redneck]

I would guess possible premolt as well... If I am not mistaken they need alot more moisture intake during the process.. So there is less problems during a molt..

But I could be completely wrong..

 

[valcan222]

This is what i was thinking.. which is why i would always make sure that the water dish is full and that i keep a spot moist.. i figured that if she decided she didnt want more mostiure she would go to the dry area lol. so then Ladysharon how soon before the molt did your B. boehemi molt after displaying this behaviour?

 

[LadySharon]

Ok...

First I admit, I noticed the spider upside down in a courner and I had missed the pre-molt signs. I thought the cage was too dry so I very very carefully poured some water into the oppocite corner. (note this is a 10" cage and the spider at the time was about 2.5")

a "finger" of water snaked out over the substrate to the center before soaking in. (substrate was peatmoss I belive - I don't think I have switched that cage to coco fiber)

now... if it had flipped over 10 min later I would have thought I had distrubed it. But it wasn't until a full hour later that it flipped back over. Then about 10 min after that (I was checking every 10 min so it may have been less time then that) I found the spider on it's side in the "finger" wet spot. Just like a cat stretching itself to fit a sunbeam.

Anyway I was kinda freaked at the time so I didn't take a picture - too much weirdness I thought it wouldn't molt right.

And I HAVE had molt problems with BB's before. That spider had as a small sling almost died when it molted within it's burrow (smaller container). I saved it by putting it in a icu (after waiting over 24 hours to see if it would recover) then the molt after that it lost it's palps. SO I'm all paranoid with this one.

But it molted fine.

The SECOND time this happened (and the last molt) I noticed the premolt condition and put extra water in the cage ahead of time.

A few days after I did that I again noticed the spider in the DRY side of the cage - flipped. I was heading to work... before I did I acctually said to myself that I BET I'd find the molt in the wet spot.

Sure enough when I got home from work there was the molt - a good 5" away from where the spider started - in the middle of the cage where the sub was moist. and the newly molted spider next to it.

Now it has a big (for the cage) shallow water dish. I just hope the NEXT time it doesn't flat out molt in the dish. And it's getting close to that time. I think when the weather warms up a bit I'll see another molt.

- Sharon